• Steam's Midweek Madness Deal is 66% off all FlatOut games

• Steam's Daily Deal is Solar 2 for $5 (50% off)

• Impulse's Daily Deal is Supreme Ruler: Cold War for $10.50 (66% off)

• Green Man Gaming has The Darkness II for $37.80 (24% off), Saints Row: The Third for $40 (20% off), and F.E.A.R. 3 for $15.40 (62% off)

• Good Old Games has the very underrated space shooter Darkstar One for $4 (60% off)

• GamersGate still has the Cities in Motion Bundle for $13.60 (66% off)

• Amazon has Battlefield: Bad Company 2 for $7 (65% off)

Rockstar Games has announced the "official" release date for the upcoming third-person shooter sequel, Max Payne 3. And by official, they apparently mean we should ignore the last announcement they made about it a few months ago, saying it would arrive in March. Because instead, we'll be getting the game on May 29th in NA and June 1st in Europe, a couple weeks after the console versions land this May 15th.

For Max, the tragedies that took his loved ones years ago are wounds that refuse to heal. No longer a cop, close to washed up and addicted to pain killers, he takes a job in São Paulo, Brazil, protecting the family of wealthy real estate mogul Rodrigo Branco, in an effort to finally escape his troubled past. But as events spiral out of his control, Max Payne finds himself alone on the streets of an unfamiliar city, desperately searching for the truth and fighting for a way out.

Featuring cutting edge shooting mechanics for precision gunplay, advanced new Bullet Time® and Shootdodge™ effects, full integration of Natural Motion’s Euphoria Character Behavior system for lifelike movement and a dark and twisted story, Max Payne 3 is a seamless, highly detailed, cinematic experience.

In addition to an expansive single-player campaign, Max Payne 3’s multiplayer offering brings the game’s cinematic feel, fluid gunplay and kinetic sense of movement into the realm of online multiplayer. Building on the fiction and signature gameplay elements of the Max Payne universe, Max Payne 3 features a wide range of new and traditional multiplayer modes that play on the themes of paranoia, betrayal and heroism, all delivered with the same epic visual style of the single-player game.

• Steam's Midweek Madness deal is 66% off all FlatOut games

• Steam's Daily Deal is the Painkiller Complete Pack for $5 (75% off), they also have Evochron Mercenary for $20 (20% off), Blackwell adventure games for $3.75 (25% off) each

• Impulse's Daily Deal is R.U.S.E. for $15 (50% off), they also still have Batman: Arkham City for $25 (50% off), Borderlands for $10 (50% off), and Mount & Blade: Warband for $10.50 (65% off)

• Direct2Drive's Daily Deal is Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition for $20 (50% off)

• Green Man Gaming has The Darkness II for $37.80 (24% off), Saints Row: The Third for $40 (20% off), and F.E.A.R. 3 for $15.40 (62% off)

• GamersGate has the Cities in Motion Collection for $13.60 (66% off)

• Amazon has Medal of Honor for $7 (65% off)

At the end, it mentions a trio of EXCLUSIVE FACTION PACKS that will entice you to pre-order the game from one of many various places (then released as DLC later, no doubt), which are previewed with the images in the above gallery. As RPS points out, they might be some of the most absurdly half-covered-with-logos screenshots ever used to promote a game. And did they really name a clan after President Obama, or was that an actual thing back then? Heh.

• Bloodlines the PC game is a big inspiration to the MMO, they are trying to capture the same atmosphere/using it as a point of reference.
• He finds PnP RPG's natural to move into a MMO as it is about individual characters not a specific one (ie Spiderman).
• A lot of focus on player to player interactions due to lack of GM unlike a table top session.
• Confirms single shard concept from EVE will be used due to shared technology. (Who called this 6 months ago? oh that's right, me. )
• States there is still a AAA team working on the MMO from all aspects of the gaming industry.
• Wanted to focus on vampires only to give depth due to focusing on only one playable supernatural on launch.
• Said on the surface the game will not seem to be about supernaturals but becomes evident when your character digs into the game world.

This DLC offers a unique new perspective into the incidents in the main story of Dead Island: This time the player will get the chance to play as Ryder White, the antagonist of the main game; learn more about his motivations and why, from his point of view, he did what he had to do. This fresh take on the Dead Island story shows Ryder White both as a military man and a loving husband.

The DLC stars Ryder White as a newly playable character and offers a single player campaign with several hours of story content with twists and turns that will shed new light on the game’s happenings. Two blueprints and weapons will further expand the already impressive arsenal of Dead Island.

The DLC will be available on February 01, 2012 for the PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system, the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and Windows PC. It will be available for 800 Microsoft points on Xbox LIVE Marketplace or for £7.99 on PSN and Steam.

It wouldn't be a Ubisoft game release without some kind of controversy, eh? The publisher recently put out the latest entry in their series of ANNO strategy games, and though it doesn't use their infamous always-on DRM, the way they've implemented third-party provider Solidshield's Tages system seems a bit more restrictive than usual.

Usually, Tages is meant to enforce an installation limit in order to prevent illegal sharing (something that's entirely redundant/unnecessary for a game on Steam, but I digress), usually set at 3 times or 3 different computers. However, ANNO 2070 apparently recognizes a changed video card as an entirely new system, which could cause you to run out of those limited installs rather quickly, depending on your upgrading habits.

This story comes from established hardware site Guru3D, who over the weekend vented their frustrations with ANNO's DRM in a post titled, "Why Guru3D probably never will review Ubisoft titles anymore."

So yesterday I started working on a performance review. We know (well at least we figured we knew), that the game key can be used on three systems. That's fair, the first activation is used on my personal game rig. The second we installed on the AMD Radeon graphics test PC and the 3rd on our NVIDIA graphics test PC.

On the AMD Radeon PC we initially test the Radeon HD 7970, then to match the timedemo sequence we install the NVIDIA system, which has a GeForce GTX 580. So far it's all good, we have created a timedemo sequence, defined our image quality settings, took screenshots and the numbers for the first two cards.

For the NVIDIA setup I take out the GTX 580, and insert a GTX 590. When I now startup the game 'BAM', again an activation is required. Once again I fill out the key and now Ubisoft is thanking me with the message that I ran out of activations.

Here's what Ubisofts DRM is doing these days, they don't just verify the number of PCs you work on, nope .. they monitor hardware changes. So once we inserted that GeForce GTX 590 the hardware id # hash changed rendering our activation invalid.

What a bunch of rubbish ....

This means that if we'd like to make a VGA performance review on Anno 2070 we'd need to purchase the game seven times. Ubisoft claims that you can send an email towards their support so that the activations are reset, we did so .. yet are still awaiting reaction.

When contacting Ubisoft marketing here in the Netherlands, their reply goes like this: 'Sorry to disappoint you - the game is indeed restricted to 3 hardware changes and there simply is no way to bypass that. We also do not have 7 copies of the game for you'.

I'm sorry, but I am not about to purchase the title seven times to make a review that by default benefits Ubisoft sales.

Welcome to PC gaming Anno 2012.

Most games that use a machine activation limit for DRM offer an installation revocation tool to help alleviate the problem... Hopefully Ubisoft will [yet again] realize they've gone over the line and offer some small consolation to smooth things over and make life somewhat bearable for their paying customers.

Spotted on Blue's News.

Here's a fresh bit of gossip to start off your week: veteran games industry figure Kevin Dent has been filling out his Twitter feed this weekend with speculation and hearsay regarding some [ever more] troubled times ahead for THQ. He says the publisher has cancelled its entire line-up of games slated for 2014 or later, including Vigil Games' MMO Warhammer 40k: Dark Millenium Online, the Crytek-developed Homefront 2, Guillermo Del Toro's inSane trilogy, and Assassin's Creed creator Patrice Désilets' new project.

All of this, in addition to returning licensed IPs to their various owners (including Disney), is supposed to be in preparation for seeking a buyer to save the company, possibly someone from the Asian market. Dent further explains, however, that that is just one option; if THQ can't find a buyer, they would likely seek financing by other means rather than shut down completely. He points to the extremely underwhelming sales performance of the new uDraw tablet and stiff 4th quarter competition for Saints Row: The Third for why THQ is suddenly in a much worse place, financially, than they have been even in the past few years.

Some would say the writing has been on the wall all year, with their stock price sliding all throughout 2011. At less than $0.70, it's reached its lowest point this week since the mid-90s, after peaking at around $36 in 2007. That puts their market cap at about $45 million, the lowest of any of the big-name game publishers. As Dent puts it, "Activision and EA can afford to make mistakes, THQ can't. It's that simple."

Game Informer have reached out to THQ for comment on the swirling rumors, but of course they deny any knowledge of such activities. Mayhaps we can expect an official statement on the matter sometime this week.

Spotted on VG247.

EA/BioWare have revealed by way of a FAQ posted on their official forums that digital game store/library/launcher client Origin will be required for all copies of Mass Effect 3. Additionally, they've confirmed that the third installment of the sci-fi action RPG series will not be available for sale on Valve's Steam store, providing the same old vague explanation -- word for word -- as to why that is. ME3 will still be sold through various other digital distributors, however, just not their biggest competition.

Also worth noting in the FAQ is how they word the answer concerning the collection of data from Origin users' computers, mentioning only that you will be able to opt out of "Mass Effect 3 data collection" from within the game. (There have been widespread reports in the past year about Origin snooping around your entire hard drive through its background processes, and how their EULA claims full authority to do so.)

2) Is constant Origin connection required or is it a single one off authentication when the game is first installed. Is there also a limit to the number of installations available?
Mass Effect 3 will require a one time, single authorization for the single player game. There is no limit to the number of installs. Playing Mass Effect 3 Multiplayer will require a constant connection.

3) Is Origin required for the retail versions of the game?
Origin is required for the PC versions of Mass Effect 3, both physical and digital.

4) Will ME3 be available on Steam?
During initial release Mass Effect 3 will be available on Origin and a number of other 3rd party digital retailers, but not on Steam at this time. Steam has adopted a set of restrictive terms of service which limit how developers interact with customers to deliver patches and other downloadable content. We are intent on providing Mass Effect to players with the best possible experience no matter where they purchase or play their game, and are happy to partner with any download service that does not restrict our ability to connect directly with our consumers.

5) Is there an opt in or opt out clause for data collection?
Users will be allowed to opt-out of Mass Effect 3 data collection from inside the game.

6) I’ve seen reports that Origin is spyware. Is this true?
Origin is not spyware, and does not use or install spyware on user’s machines. In order to allow Origin to install games and their patches for everyone to use, Origin implements a permission change that results in Windows, not Origin, reviewing the filenames in the ProgramData/Origin folder. This is an ordinary Windows function, not an information-gathering process.

• Steam's Weekend Deal is Dead Space and Dead Space 2 for $5 (75% off) each, they also have Nation Red for $2.50 (75% off), which you can play for free through Sunday at 1pm PST

• Steam's Daily Deal is Front Mission Evolved for $10.20 (66% off), they also have Blackwell adventure games for $3.75 (25% off) each

• Impulse's Daily Deal is Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Bundle for $23 (50% off), they also have Batman: Arkham City for $25 (50% off) and Hard Reset for $15 (50% off)

• Direct2Drive's Daily Deal is Call of Juarez: The Cartel for $25 (50% off)

• Green Man Gaming is running a pretty decent New Year's sale with several great deals including Deus Ex: Human Revolution Augmented Edition for $15 (75% off), Space Pirates and Zombies for $3.75 (75% off), Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War II - Retribution for $15 (50% off), Warhammer 40k: Space Marine for $25 (50% off), Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light for $7.50 (50% off), Homefront for $15 (50% off), Magicka Collection for $8 (60% off), Just Cause 2 for $15 (50% off), and the Guild Wars Trilogy for $15 (50% off)

• GamersGate still has Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 for $5 (75% off) each

Kalypso Media has announced the first full-size expansion pack to be released for the latest iteration of their island dictator sim series will be arriving this March. Tropico 4: Modern Times features "an extensive new single-player campaign, new buildings, fresh challenges, additional presidential edicts and more" dealing with the modernization of the lazy Caribbean islands, which can be yours for $19.99/£19.99/€24.99 or 1200 MS points. You can check and the teaser trailer above and read more details here:

The times are changing and the island nation of Tropico is evolving. The Internet, a New World Order, terrorists, global financial markets and space exploration are on the rise and pose new challenges to El Presidente and his regime in Tropico 4: Modern Times.

Old buildings and structures are becoming obsolete and need to be upgraded or even replaced by their modern counterparts. Cars and transportation need modernisation to meet the needs of a changing economy; and now El Presidente can even send people to the International Space Station! El Presidente and his ministers must now join the war against terror and control Internet regulation and freedom of speech on Tropico.

Key Features

• Make Tropico fit for the 21st century: Evolve the island from the Cold War era to modern times and even into the future
• 30 new buildings become available as time progresses, including condos, skyscrapers, organic ranches and biofarms. Replace obsolete buildings with these modern and inspiring designs.
• Upgrade old buildings to new variants – modernized apartment buildings, banks, museums and much more
• 10 new edicts allow even more control over your citizens’ lives. Block or limit citizens’ Internet use, create a police state or be a “good guy” and launch the Festival of Love edict.
• New single player campaign comprised of 12 comprehensive scenario missions. Protect Tropico from unseen and sinister forces.

CD Projekt, the Polish game publisher and developer responsible for such things as GOG.com and The Witcher, caught some flak last month when it was discovered they had been utilizing the services of an anti-piracy firm to track down and threaten those individuals that may have illegally downloaded their newest release. They insist that their methods of identifying pirates are very reliable, but many fans expressed worry and outrage over the possibility of innocent parties being accidentally targeted, leading to them being asked to pay figures in the area of $750 to avoid being dragged into court over the matter.

This week, it's been announced that CD Projekt has listened to its fans and decided to stop such practices, though they still take piracy very seriously. It's all explained in this open letter to the community:

In early December, an article was published about a law firm acting on behalf of CD Projekt RED, contacting individuals who had downloaded The Witcher 2 illegally and seeking financial compensation for copyright infringement. The news about our decision to combat piracy directly, instead of with DRM, spread quickly and with it came a number of concerns from the community. Repeatedly, gamers just like you have said that our methods might wrongly accuse people who have never violated our copyright and expressed serious concern about our actions.

Being part of a community is a give-and-take process. We only succeed because you have faith in us, and we have worked hard over the years to build up that trust. We were sorry to see that many gamers felt that our actions didn’t respect the faith that they have put into CD Projekt RED. Our fans always have been and remain our greatest concern, and we pride ourselves on the fact that you all know that we listen to you and take your opinions to heart. While we are confident that no one who legally owns one of our games has been required to compensate us for copyright infringement, we value our fans, our supporters, and our community too highly to take the chance that we might ever falsely accuse even one individual.

So we’ve decided that we will immediately cease identifying and contacting pirates.

Let’s make this clear: we don’t support piracy. It hurts us, the developers. It hurts the industry as a whole. Though we are staunch opponents of DRM because we don’t believe it has any effect on reducing piracy, we still do not condone copying games illegally. We’re doing our part to keep our relationship with you, our gaming audience, a positive one. We’ve heard your concerns, listened to your voices, and we’re responding to them. But you need to help us and do your part: don’t be indifferent to piracy. If you see a friend playing an illegal copy of a game–any game–tell your friend that they’re undermining the possible success of the developer who created the very game that they are enjoying. Unless you support the developers who make the games you play, unless you pay for those games, we won’t be able to produce new excellent titles for you.

Keep on playing,

Marcin Iwinski
co-founder
CD Projekt RED

• Steam's Weekend Deal is Dead Space and Dead Space 2 for $5 (75% off) each, they also have Nation Red for $2.50 (75% off), which you can play for free through Sunday at 1pm PST

• Steam's Daily Deal is PT Boats Gold for $5 (66% off)

• Impulse's Daily Deal is Borderlands for $10 (50% off), they also have Batman: Arkham City for $25 (50% off) and Hard Reset for $15 (50% off)

• Direct2Drive's Daily Deal is Cities in Motion for $7 (65% off)

• Green Man Gaming is running a pretty decent New Year's sale with several great deals including Deus Ex: Human Revolution for $25 (50% off), Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War II - Retribution for $15 (50% off), Warhammer 40k: Space Marine for $25 (50% off), Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light for $7.50 (50% off), Homefront for $15 (50% off), Air Conflict: Secret Wars for $17.50 (50% off), Magicka Collection for $8 (60% off), Just Cause 2 for $15 (50% off), Hitman: Blood Money for $2.50 (75% off), and the Guild Wars Trilogy for $15 (50% off)

• GamersGate has Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 for $5 (75% off) each

The official S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Facebook page brings the good word, that development of the next game in the series is carrying on after all.

The Stalker team is extremely happy! Why? Because we are continuing work on Stalker 2 after the holidays.

Spotted on Blue's News.

• Steam's Midweek Madness Deal is Bejeweled 3 for $5 (75% off)

• Steam's Daily Deal is Ignite for $6.75 (66% off)

• Impulse's Daily Deal is the Far Cry Bundle for $15 (50% off)

• Direct2Drive's Daily Deal is GRID for $10 (75% off)

• Green Man Gaming is running a pretty decent New Year's sale with several great deals including F.E.A.R. 3 for $6 (60% off), Deus Ex: Human Revolution for $25 (50% off), Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War II - Retribution for $15 (50% off), Warhammer 40k: Space Marine for $25 (50% off), Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light for $7.50 (50% off), Deus Ex: Invisible War for $2.50 (75% off), Magicka Collection for $8 (60% off), Just Cause 2 for $15 (50% off), Hitman: Blood Money for $5 (50% off), Hitman 2: Silent Assassin for $2.50 (75% off), and the Guild Wars Trilogy for $15 (50% off)

EA and Big Huge Games have announced that they will be releasing a playable demo for their upcoming action-RPG Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning next Tuesday, January 17th. Sounds like it's one of those with a time limit, so maybe someone will figure out how to play it indefinitely:

The Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning demo features the introduction to the game, allowing players to experience the game’s Tutorial Mode and a portion of its large, open world. Players will create and customize their hero and drop right into the action. Once players master the basics, they will have 45 minutes to explore the vast world of Amalur and begin to embark upon a quest that could redefine their character’s destiny forever.

By playing the Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning demo, gamers will receive two unlocks for Mass Effect 3 when the highly anticipated game releases on March 6, 2012, both designed by the renowned creator of Spawn, Todd McFarlane:

• Reckoner Knight Armor: This armor will maximize damage done in close-quarters combat while a beefed–up power cell feeds energy into weapon systems to increase projectile velocity.
• The Chakram Launcher: This weapon uses a fabricator to manufacture lightweight, explosive ammunition discs. This weapon is earned after completing the Reckoning demo and watching the trailer at the end.

By playing the upcoming Mass Effect 3 demo, fans will unlock the following items for Reckoning when the game launches on February 7, inspired by Mass Effect:

• N7 Armor: Players can unlock special armor inspired by Commander Shepard’s iconic N7 battle armor including Helm, Cuirass, Gauntlets, Chausses and Greaves.
• Onmiblade Daggers: A holographic blade stemming from Commander Shepard’s Omni-Tool, the Omni-blade allows players to stab enemies in close combat. Once players install and play the Mass Effect 3 demo, they will unlock the daggers.

In addition to the Mass Effect items above, players who play the Reckoning demo will also unlock:

• Twist of Fate Card: This card boosts the player’s ice resistance and is immediately unlocked when he or she activates the Reckoning demo using his or her Origin account.
• Twinned Souls Chakram: A unique weapon that damages enemies while boosting player health and mana in Reckoning.
• The Infernal Helm: Unlocked after completing the Reckoning Tutorial Mode, this protective helmet increases players’ fire damage throughout Amalur.

• Steam's Midweek Madness deal is Bejeweled 3 for $5 (75% off)

• Steam's Daily Deal is Aztaka for $3.40 (66% off)

• Impulse's Daily Deal is Duke Nukem Forever for $10 (50% off)

• Direct2Drive's Daily Deal is Sengoku for $15 (50% off)

• Green Man Gaming is running a pretty decent New Year's sale with several great deals including Batman: Arkham City for $20 (60% off), Deus Ex: Human Revolution for $25 (50% off), Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War II - Retribution for $15 (50% off), Warhammer 40k: Space Marine for $25 (50% off), Deus Ex GOTY Edition for $2.50 (75% off), Magicka Collection for $8 (60% off), Just Cause 2 for $15 (50% off), Hitman: Blood Money for $5 (50% off), and the Guild Wars Trilogy for $15 (50% off)

• GamersGate has the King Arthur Collection for $10.20 (66% off)

Microsoft announced at CES that they're preparing to launch a PC-specific revision of their Kinect motion sensor peripheral very soon. Sporting features like the ability to detect movements a mere 40-50 centimeters away and a shorter USB cable, Kinect for Windows will become available on February 1st at a suggested retail price of $250. Why the inflated price compared to the add-on for Xbox 360 (which goes for $150)? They say that the ability to offer that lower price is subsidized by all the other money people spend on the console, such as purchasing games, subscribing to the LIVE service, etc., and that that SKU is not licensed for commercial use like the new one is.

With Kinect for Windows, we are investing in creating a platform that is optimized for scenarios beyond the living room, and delivering new software features on an ongoing basis, starting with “near mode” (see my earlier blog post for more about this). In addition to support for Windows 7 and the Windows 8 developer preview (desktop apps only), Kinect for Windows will also support gesture and voice on Windows Embedded-based devices and will enhance how data is captured and accessed within intelligent systems across manufacturing, retail and many more industries. We are building the Kinect for Windows platform in a way that will allow other companies to integrate Kinect into their offerings and we have invested in an approach that allows them to develop in ways that are dependable and scalable.

Spotted on RPS.

• Steam's Daily Deal is Lucid for $1.25 (75% off)

• Impulse's Daily Deal is Hard Reset for $15 (50% off)

• Direct2Drive's Daily Deal is Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II for $16 (60% off)

• Green Man Gaming is running a pretty decent New Year's sale with several great deals including Dungeon Siege III for $12.50 (75% off), Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War II - Retribution for $15 (50% off), Warhammer 40k: Space Marine for $25 (50% off), Magicka Collection for $8 (60% off), Just Cause 2 for $15 (50% off), Alien Breed Trilogy for $11.50 (50% off), and the Guild Wars Trilogy for $15 (50% off)

• GamersGate has the King Arthur Collection for $10.20 (66% off) and EVE Online: Incarna for $10 (50% off)

It seems that, ever since Bethesda Softworks (now owned by Zenimax Media, Inc.) acquired the Fallout license from original publisher Interplay Entertainment, we've heard more about legal battles than any new games coming from the latter. The past couple years have been full of courtroom disputes surrounding Interplay's alleged failure to adhere to the terms of the licensing agreement, which stipulated they must raise $30 million in capital and begin full-scale development of their Fallout MMO by the spring of 2009. Other points of contention were Interplay's right to build upon established locations, themes, characters, etc. from existing Fallout titles, of which Bethesda insisted they had none, as well as the unauthorized leasing of development to a third party, Masthead Studios.

Interplay had issued press releases and newsletters promoting development of Fallout Online throughout 2010, but perhaps those constituted little more than a feeble attempt to prove they had held up their end of the bargain. Indeed, it's been a long and bumpy road, but it finally ended recently with a $2 million settlement paid by Bethesda in exchange for Interplay conceding the rights to make a Fallout MMO game. All such privileges will default back to Bethesda, current owner of the franchise (though that does not necessarily mean they'll be making an MMO, just that nobody else can). The settlement also purports that full ownership of the original trilogy of games -- Fallout, Fallout 2, and Fallout: Tactics -- will be transferred to Bethesda at the end of 2013, until which time Interplay will be allowed to continue selling, promoting, merchandising, and all-around profiting from them.

"While we strongly believe in the merits of our suits, we are pleased to avoid the distraction and expense of litigation while completely resolving all claims to the Fallout IP. Fallout is an important property of ZeniMax and we are now able to develop future Fallout titles for our fans without third party involvement or the overhang of others’ legal claims,” Zenimax CEO Robert Altman said.